literature

Affinity: Part XVII

Deviation Actions

sky12309's avatar
By
Published:
1.5K Views

Literature Text

Part XVII: Hell

When Alex opened the apartment door, he knew he wasn't alone. "Desmond?" he asked, catching a scent. Pheromones and chemicals: The remnants of sweat and motor oil and aftershave molded together into something undetectable to anyone but Alex, so that when he switched on the lights, he wasn't surprised to see Desmond sitting on the couch.
Puzzlement, however, still remained. "You're out of work early," Alex supplied, walking over to him. It was barely nine o' clock. "Were you trying to scare me or is there a better reason to be alone in the dark?" Desmond had evidently changed out of his work uniform, slipping on jeans, sneakers, and donning his white jacket.
There was a backpack, sitting on the floor to his side.
"Desmond?" Alex repeated, not quite settling into a panic. Still, he practically sighed in relief when Desmond stood, met his eyes for a moment, and kissed him.
There was something there: Impassionate urgency, and that made their kiss feel robotic and manufactured. Alex held Desmond by the waist, pressing gently. A few moments later and Desmond was pressing harder, planting one hand on Alex's back, the other cupping his face and touching dark hair. Trying to feel; trying to find something that Alex wasn't sure he could give.
But still. That was more like it, Alex thought. Tired to think. He learned a long time ago that it was better to just not think about anything when he kissed Desmond, touched Desmond – or if Desmond did any of that to him. No, it was a lot more enjoyable to just feel this sort of thing – the close bodies and hot mouths and roaming fingers – and for once, his brain actually listened to him and kept quiet until they both had to breathe again.
Just when he was beginning to move his hands around Desmond's hips, pushing his shirt up inch by tantalizing inch, Desmond pulled away with no warning.
He still hadn't said anything, and even now he was wiping the back of his hand against his mouth, looking away in what was a tossup between shame, regret, and anxiety.
"I have to go," he said, and the words dropped down on Alex so quickly he wasn't quite sure he had heard it right.
"What?"
"They found me. Templars. Someone. They know about me and they know about us and…" his shoulders sagged. "I'm leaving. I should have been gone hours ago but – I… I wanted to say goodbye." Desmond gazed at Alex for another stretch of time, and Alex wondered how Desmond could look into the face of a drowning man so calmly.
"You're…" Alex blinked and creased his eyebrows, trying to remember how to take in air and talk at the same time. "…Going? Just like that?" He didn't notice the accusation planted in his words until Desmond winced at them.
"It's not like I want to. I told you – if I had the choice, I would never leave you." He glanced to the right of him and hauled up his backpack by one of the straps, slinging it over his shoulder. "But I don't have that choice." Desmond took two steps back – towards the door – until Alex moved forward and grabbed a hold of his arm. Desmond sagged even more then, looking desperate and sad and Alex would have done anything in that moment to just make the hurt look go away. "Alex," Desmond murmured. "Come on, let me go."
"No." he said with a tone of finality – as if he had to think about it. "No – I can't."
Desmond turned away from him again, staring at the door. "You said you wouldn't make me stay," he murmured, and Alex could remember that day – he could remember all of their days in a flash of time that spanned not even a second – and instead of cringing and clutching his skull, he had to resist the urge to smile; and this time when he snapped back to the present, he had a hard time convincing himself that he wanted to.
Everything hurt a lot less, back then. And that was a sentence he'd never thought would be true for him, so he closed the gap between the both of them and embraced Desmond again. There was no kissing this time – and this time, Desmond didn't bother touching back. He just stood there as Alex placed a chin on his shoulder, like he was waiting for Alex to hurry up and be done with it so he could leave.
"I said that a long time ago," Alex replied; voice scratchy and muffled against the jacket he was talking into. He kept on inhaling the scent that lay there, and if that was a distraction or simply because he wanted to remember, he couldn't tell. "Before I got attached. Before I thought…" he paused and let out a wet laugh. He sniffed. Desmond still hadn't moved. "Before I knew I couldn't live without you."
"Don't say that." Desmond whispered harshly.
"It's true."
"No. No it isn't true," he thrashed left and right until he had enough room to push himself out of Alex's grasp. He backed up again. "Don't you ever say that. Don't you ever think that because – because you don't need me. You don't need anyone. I can't stay here – I can't do anything; but you can."
"Not without you," Alex said back, too empty to feel some sense of shame as he let himself unravel in front of the other man. "You're the reason I can change – have changed."
"I haven't done anything to you," Desmond said, eyes set in a glare, as if Alex had thrown blame upon him. "Not anything you couldn't have done yourself." He took another step back, and Alex wondered if Desmond was just going to break out into a run but – he stayed put, staring, satchel still slung over his back. Alex noticed for the first time that Desmond had shaved his head, just enough to leave it closely cropped so that there was no blonde showing anymore. "So just…"
"It's not fair," Alex said abruptly, feeling a surge of energy heighten his senses again. "I said I would help you – protect you; and I can't even-"
"-Stop talking like it's your fault," Desmond said sullenly, but Alex continued on anyway.
"I can do it. I can track the Templars – these… people. I can find them." Their gaze met for a moment; brown on blue. "And I can kill them." Alex's eyes glowed in the darkness of the room as he said that. "I will kill anyone that tries to take you away from me – I… will protect you." There was a crackling silence between the both of them.
"No." Desmond said again. "I'm not going to let you kill anyone because of me."
"But they're hunting you! They-"
"I know what they've done Alex, thank-you," he said callously. "But I'm not going to just sit on a throne somewhere while you run off and get rid of anyone who sneezes in my direction. People like you, now! They're starting to, anyway." He stuck a hand in his pocket and stared past Alex, at the large window on the other side of the room; the one covered by deep, thick curtains. "Are you really going to become a monster for one stupid person?"
"Yes." Alex replied with no pretense of hesitation, no concept of thought, and Desmond could only groan back at him.
"Stop that! Stop… stop thinking that I'm important – I'm not! I'm really, really not. You could be saying this to any other runaway, you know. If you met them instead of me, and it wouldn't have made a difference."
"But you are important – to me at least." Desmond was shaking his head, as if he didn't believe him – didn't want to believe him. And Alex kept on talking because indecision was the only hope he could cling to, now: "With you, I'm… happy. With you, I feel like I'm normal, like I'm human-"
"But you're not a fucking human, Alex! This is what I've been trying to say. I don't matter – but you keep on putting me on a goddamn pedestal; you keep thinking that I can fix you – that I can snap my fingers and make everything easy?" he barked out a laugh at that: "Fuck, I can't even do that to myself – much less the both of us. I would love to stop running – I would love that more than anything else in the world – but I can't. Because this is how I've kept myself safe for nine years. And I don't need you to keep me safe, Alex. I don't need anyone but myself – and you don't need me either, alright? And maybe you realize this, maybe you don't, but I'm not sticking around."
"…You're not?"
Desmond shook his head, coming down from his rant. "I can't."
Alex paced towards Desmond again. "So, this is it, then? You're going to quit – just like that."
"Well, that's a good way of putting it." Desmond settled a dark glare on Alex.
"You can't just run away from everything, Desmond."
"Why? It seems to have worked well for the both of us so far." He clenched his teeth for a moment before continuing, as if holding back what he was about to say: "Besides, it's better than your method of murdering everyone."
"If it worked," Alex replied.
"How well did it work for Dana?" Desmond spat back – and then they both froze, realizing that they hit on a peculiar nerve. Alex reacted first, throwing his shoulders back in that hilariously humanoid manner of making oneself look threatening; Desmond could feel the pulses of heat come off his body; he could practically see the crackle of power discharging into the air.
"What did you say?"
"You said that you would protect her, right? Back then? Well, how long was she in that coma, Alex? Two years? More? At least my method keeps me conscious."
Desmond's skin prickled even before Alex reached out and grasped ruthlessly at his arm. This time it wasn't pleading – it just hurt. But Desmond was too angry to think that this was a bad idea – that making Alex mad was just asking for some form of tragedy – because he knew he was going to leave tonight. And if that meant burning bridges, well - "Let me go." He hissed out, not even trying to break free.
"Take it back," Alex whispered in a threatening way. Empty or not, Desmond leered and pushed forward.
"Only if you want me to lie to your face. But, hey, I'm sure you've done the same to me, so-"
"Bastard!" Alex yelled out.
"Because you can never be wrong, can you Alex?" Desmond called back. He glanced down and saw Alex's free arm was shaking; a tight fist made. He was holding back – subconsciously or not – but Desmond wasn't. He couldn't. He had to leave, and no one – not even Alex – was going to stop him. He crushed his own hand up into a ball and hissed out, "Isn't that-"
Desmond stretched his arm back and punched Alex as hard as he could.
And that time, he had been aiming to break something.
Maybe Alex felt it enough to actually be in pain, but Desmond had just been looking for a chance to wrench himself free from the other. He drew his arms back and jumped onto the arm of the couch, using it as leverage to catapult himself up, off the ground – until he was stumbling backwards the door, out of Alex's reach.
The other man stared at him, hands on his chest where he had been hit – maybe it did hurt.
And maybe Desmond didn't care.
"You just…" Alex whispered, glancing at where Desmond had been only a moment ago – at the settee, now tilted from the force of the push off.
"One of those things they taught us," Desmond said, resolved to snub any more advancements. He couldn't afford it.
"And you never-?"
"-Told you?" Desmond asked, placing a throbbing hand on the door. "No, I guess I didn't. Maybe I just wanted some secrets to keep for myself." Alex was silent for long enough that Desmond assumed that he had finally run out of things to say.
"Please," he said, finally. "Just… stay. I can fix this. We can fix this. And you can do whatever you want – I can get you your own place, if you want. We can just be friends, if you want that, too." As Alex talked Desmond was busy undoing the locks on the door with little clicks and metallic slides.
"That's a good plan," Desmond offered – and he wasn't looking at Alex anymore, but the door. His hand rested on the handle as if he was thinking it over. As if there was the slightest degree of a chance that-
Desmond let the door swing open, and the foyer erupted in pale, artificial light.
"But I don't know what I want." He put both backpack straps over his shoulders and took a few decisive steps forward. Out of the apartment, into the hall, and for a moment he glanced back over his shoulder at Alex Mercer, who was still lodged deep in the dark recesses of his home.
Not theirs. His.
"Goodbye, Alex." Desmond said, and the sound of the door slamming shut wasn't enough to wake Alex from his nightmare.

xxxx

One Minute. It had been one minute since Desmond shut the door for the last time.
One Minute.
It didn't seem possible that everything important happened in the insignificant span of a minute. His human counterpart's death – and so many other deaths he had caused – the threat of a nuke stopped.
And now this.
While on the subject, it also wasn't fair that such a small amount of time had the ability to be important. It wasn't fair that his creation and near destruction were on par with a door slamming shut.
But here he was – Alex was. Not Desmond. Desmond wasn't coming back.
Desmond deserved better than coming back – Desmond deserved someone better than him; someone who saw him as a person. Not a solution. He could argue a million things, but Alex knew that. Maybe he loved Desmond – but he loved the idea of him too. He thought Desmond was enough to give sustenance to them both. Somewhere in their relationship there had formed a dependency that Alex couldn't shake himself out of.
He was shaking now.
He trembled as he turned from the door and stepped past the couch. He shook as he tore the curtains from the window and stared stared down the long flights of the building; eyeing the black pavement. Maybe he had been standing for more than a minute – maybe an hour, maybe a day; he could stand there his whole goddamn life and Alex bet that he wouldn't even notice.
So he fell.
Just so he could feel something; if it was only the humid wind brushing through his clothes as he continued to drop like a dead weight. And he wanted to be furious – he wanted to blame Desmond for what he had done to him, he wanted him to hurt just like he was – but that was the problem.
When you loved someone, you only wanted to help them. Protect them. Keep them.
Well, he had helped Desmond, for a little while. But he was gone – and Desmond didn't need him – never needed him, maybe, if they weren't lying to each other.
The ground glared up at him and Alex didn't bother to slow himself – he had lost so much biomass already; he hadn't consumed in so many weeks. So when he landed – on top of an NYPD cruiser that was ambling down the slowly deteriorating roads, looking for trouble, he knew it was going to hurt.
The bullet proof glass splintered and cracked under his weight in orchestrated destruction. The steel groaned as it twisted and bent to fit the man-sized crater he had made. Alex was almost certain that part of the engine had lodged itself through is leg, because why else would there be a trail of blood coming down the hood of the tattered and torn car?
Behind him, there was a groan.
Alex could just turn his head; left, right – his skull had went through the glass and roof, and his shoulders kept him wedged in place.
A man was staring at him. A little older, in the passenger seat. There was blood coming on his lip. He unhinged his jaw and red began to slip out; one hand was limply left on the car door, and his other was twitching and hemorrhaging under Alex's head; crushed and useless. Another turn and there was an unconscious women, bent into the driver's wheel. Her hair and skin – both shades of brown – were covered in a bright sheet of scarlet. Alex couldn't tell where all the blood was coming from. A moment later, the sun shone through the spider web of cracked and shattered and broken glass to reveal hundreds of shards that had embedded themselves into the woman's skin. Alex felt a brittle crackle as he moved his arm up; he was dimly aware that more bits of the windshield were digging into his fingers, but – he broke a small hole in the glass and just managed to touch his hand to the woman's neck.
He felt a pulse. Again, the man was groaning.
"I'm… sorry," he whispered. He wasn't sure if he was calling out to Desmond or just the two in the car. Slowly, he felt them. The small threads of biomass creeping along the wreckage, moving up his arms, past his body, surrounding the two bleeders. "I'm sorry, I'm sorry," he kept on muttering as he felt the bindings grow tighter, thicker – the woman remained in her coma but the man was twisting and pulling; banging his head against the lowered, dented roof. He screamed in total agony as those tentacles bore through him – cut through and dissected him like he was no harder to kill than a bug. And then the yells and cries turned into a guttural sounding groan, and Alex knew he had ripped through his lungs; then his vocal cords; then his brain. More red sprayed the inside of the car; coating his clothes, running down his cheeks and onto his lips and even as he could feel their lives seep into his mind – like lonely souls slowly waltzing into a collective – he could only mumble a broken apology as their pain mixed with his own, and his tears mixed with their blood.
This is what you're fighting for, Desmond said, off in the distance of his memory, and that only made him weep.

xxxx     

One Week. It had been one week and one thousand miles, but even in the sticky mess of a dead-end summer he still shuttered at night. He still felt empty. He was empty. He had nothing – which was nothing new to Desmond, because he never really had anything in the first place but at least he didn't mind then.
Leaving was nothing new, Desmond thought. He rolled around against the scratchy comforter on the borrowed bed. It was disgusting; the never washed covers of cheap models, but he was just so cold all the time, now. The heavy duty white hoodie he had gotten back in… well. He could barely stand to take it off now.
"You're used to this," he said softly to himself, voice humbly sinking into the pillows around his head. "He knew. I said goodbye. That's more than I can say for every other place I've been." The out-loud reasoning was supposed to make him feel better – to alleviate some of his guilt, some regret – at least convince him to close his eyes for a moment. But… but…
He kicked the dirty covers off his body and switched on the bedside lamp. The room was cream colored and faded with floral patterns on the wall – muted and silent and, where there was no wall or ceiling, heavy, dusty material covered the space. Curtains and carpet and sheets; all offering the false pretenses of warmth and protection. He opened the side table's top drawer, hearing the small wheels on its track pop with the movement. He snorted as he peered inside: Bible and a phone book – some things never changed.
Too bad he didn't believe in it, he figured, reaching for the yellow pages instead of the faux leather bound, gold encrusted tome. Sure, he didn't have anyone to call, but he didn't have anyone to pray to, either.
Desmond glanced down at the infinite stream of numbers sloping down the page.
"I'll get over it," he said. Confidently. He flipped through another set of pages too thin to properly separate. He stared at the names, looking for new, unused ones.
"I'll get over him." He blinked a few times in quick succession. "I'm used to this. I…" he swallowed, looked up, looked down. "I said goodbye. That meant something." It did – didn't it? It meant he wanted closure – it meant that he cared enough to want closure. He never said goodbye. He never warned anyone. Except for Alex. He never trusted anyone except Alex. He never lived with – never laughed with – never, shit, never made love with anyone except Alex.
Because it was always Alex, wasn't it?
"It's… fuck," he said urgently, rubbing at his eyes. He tried to look back up, try and find a distraction (what did it matter, though – he knew places like this as if it were his job,) but he couldn't. He didn't.
The text of numbers and names and lives blurred before Desmond Miles - no more fake identities, fake histories, he was stuck by himself for now.
He made fists and wrenched his fingers into the sheets. You're used to this, he tried to tell himself.
But the second he opened his mouth his sobs came out; tears leaked down the creases of his face and made wet spots in the layers of thin phonebook pages – tears he had been holding back for a week. Tears he couldn't stop.
Why shouldn't he let himself cry? He thought, bending forward till the book slid off his legs with a clunk. People cry when they lose something they loved.
Several hundred feet away, in the tar filled plateau of the motel's parking lot, an inconspicuous van pulled up; right next to a red motorcycle. There were two people in the van. Just two – armored, masked. One had a syringe in his hand: "How much time does this give us?"
"Enough to get back home," the other said, her words crunched by an Italian accent. "Get to watch him wake up confused as hell in one of the labs."
Both doors simultaneously opened; simultaneously slammed shut. No one took notice – not even them. It was just one of those sounds that faded with the wind, carried off by the last days of August.

xxxx

Dana let her fingers hover over the keyboard, eyes stuck on the small numbers in the corner of the screen.
11:58 pm
11:59 pm
12:00 am
It was tomorrow. Dana buried her face in her arms and groaned. September 23rd. It had been a month since Desmond left. One month. Fuck, it felt like a whole goddamn year. For Alex it probably felt like a century. Of course, she never got his opinion on it. He had barely said a word to her – to anyone. As if they were still living in the Outbreak. He would be gone, hours, days at a time, only coming to her apartment with a status report or a question. Except now there was the discernable difference. Now Alex was throwing himself into the aid of others.
And this time, Dana could tell he was hurting.
It wasn't even woman's intuition or some sixth sense she had developed – it was common sense. The lumbering slowness of his movement, his downcast eyes and the gauntness of his face and body – even under the layers of clothes, it was as if his limbs were made of nothing more stable than plastic straws.
And still he kept fighting. No relief, no nutrition, he was dragging himself forward like a glass cannon waiting to shatter. And the worst part was that Dana couldn't do anything.
She was his sister, but Desmond was something to Alex that she couldn't touch, couldn't get close to. She would reach out and get nothing, and she wasn't sure if she should be angry at Desmond for leaving, or Alex for needing him, or –
Or maybe she was mad because all she could do was watch.
Somewhere in the foyer, a bell went off. It wasn't Alex – unless he had finally run out of energy and couldn't even run up walls anymore. He was scared to consume – something (someone) had ruined him and, yeah, she felt so fucking useful.
She trudged over to the speaker. "Hello?" she said, finger on the button.
No response.
"Hello?" she repeated. She checked the locks on the door – it could have been an accident, she thought – prayed – hoped. She continued watching the door; hands splayed on the small copper pad. Dana counted her breaths and the pulse beating in her fingers, which was going rampant and making her face flush.
She could hear footsteps.
They were the smallest taps on the carpet outside, but she heard them. She slowly moved back from the door, waiting, waiting…
A slip of paper shot out from under the entrance.
Dana jumped, watching the envelope flutter at her feet. She pushed herself back, trying not to inhale too harshly. She stood still for a minute, still listening with buzzing ears. Finally she moved forward, fists clenched, nostrils flaring, and despite any other concepts of doubt or fear or even self preservation, she tossed her hand to the dead bolt and let the door swing open.
No one was there.
Poking her head out – looking left, right, left again for good measure, she slowly receded back into her apartment, letting the door lightly close in front of her.
She didn't know what she was expecting. Fuck, she was still half imagining someone to burst down the door as she stooped down and grasped the paper with pale, trembling fingers.
Dana creased her hands over the envelope, trying to tell what was inside. Powder? Bombs? All she could feel was the edge of a single piece of stationary. She sucked in a breath and broke through the top of the envelope.
Out of everything, Dana wasn't expecting a letter.
One page of typical printer paper. Black ink. Times New Roman Font. ' Dana Mercer,' it started, right at the headline. No pretenses of personal warmth like a simple Dana; no formality of a Ms. Mercer, either. She flicked her eyes down almost unwillingly, as if her senses all gravitated to the unread words on the page.
'We have grown aware of your continued investigations of the Abstergo Corporation. In this, we must congratulate you upon making such advanced discoveries this early in your research. Moreover, we are interested in having you work with us. We cannot promise you fortune or fame, or even guarantee that the public will see what you have written, but we can promise our full efforts will be made to protect you. Abstergo is not blind to your work; something you may have noticed in recent weeks.
We understand that it is hard to trust a simple document, just like under normal circumstances we would find it hard to trust you. But we have also learned that you, as well as your brother Alex Mercer, notably referred to as the only living sample of the Blacklight Virus currently in existence, had relations with Desmond Miles.
Under your combined care, he eluded the Abstergo Corporation for several months. Unfortunately, after leaving New York Zero he was tracked down by their agents and captured.
Regardless of whether or not he informed you, Desmond Miles was born into a line of assassins. Abstergo – acting as a front for the Templars; something you are at least vaguely aware of by now – have attempted to eradicate the world of us. Desmond has not been killed by the Templars as of now. However, there is more at risk than just his life in this war.
A second note will arrive tomorrow at five thirty if nothing is interrupted, requesting further response as to whether we may use your assistance.
One last note: Under no circumstances should you inform anyone of this exchange. Not even your brother. His relationship with Desmond was significant, as far as we can gather, and we fear that he may make radical movements if he became aware that Desmond was in danger – tactics that could upset the small amounts of tranquility and stability we have gained in the present.
The Order hopes to hear from you in the near future,'
In replace of a signature, there was an insignia resembling a minimalist compass towards the bottom of the page. She flipped the paper over, and didn't see anything else of suspicion or notice.
Dana looked around and realized that she was sitting on the edge of her couch. She leaned forward, dumping the paper on the coffee table and watched it with wary eyes. Well, she was thinking; now what?
A first thought had been to find Alex – just so she could tell him that Desmond was still alive. But then… maybe the whole thing was a trap. There was only so much to judge from one piece of paper, but Dana figured that an overtly complicated way of dragging her off somewhere secretive was a lot more trouble than, say, having someone just break in and shoot her. She'd be inclined to believe it was simply Abstergo, disguising themselves as they tended to, if it wasn't for the fact that she had already dug out some rudimentary information on an adversary that called themselves 'Assassins'. Above everything, she wanted to wake up: she wanted the real truth of what was going on; why Abstergo went from nothing to everything; why they were connected to that elusive definition of Templars; what they wanted, how they fought, and who they were fighting against.
And, of course, how Desmond had gotten himself entangled in the whole damn mess.
She tugged at her hair and thought and thought and thought; trying to decide whether to go forwards or backwards or to just stand still.
Maybe she was walking into more trouble; just another stab into her brother, while she was at it, but she was still young. Young enough, at least, and she'd be lying if the near two years she had spent under weren't influencing her at all; or the idea that if she knew what happened to Desmond – even if Alex could never know – would ease some of her own suffering in the most selfish way possible.
But still.
She stood; picking up the letter one more time; reading it through as she walked back over to her office space. The letter went straight into the shredder, and she didn't even blink as the whirring and crunching of paper filled the darkened room.
Then everything was silent. One more time.
So, this is the last chapter of Affinity. Kind of a horrible ending, right? Luckily, there is, of course an epilogue, but don't expect rainbows and kittens to come leaking out of that one, either.

And here is my attempt to thrust one of Affinity's themes into the reader's face: Love isn't all that great. It can be great, but sometimes the way we portray it is just horrible; this is especially in the case of fanfiction and Young Adult Literature, and, of course, the Romance genre itself. It is basically the thought that true love equals needing the person of your affections to be happy and to survive. This is a rant that might need a few thousand words and a Microsoft Document to do it right, so the last I can say on the subject here is simply: There is a reason why I didn't just write off a happy ending, and there is a reason why Alex and Desmond broke apart, and there is a reason why in their three months of living together they never actually said that they loved each other.

I realize I am kind of a downer; it's fine. I'll get some fluff up here soon enough to prove that I'm not a horrid bitch who got fondled as a child.
© 2011 - 2024 sky12309
Comments1
Join the community to add your comment. Already a deviant? Log In
Personally i thought it was a great ending that was very realistic so dont be too hard on yourself. I agree life isn't all butterflies and rainbows. Cant wait for the epilogue!